


Enter World, Light Unshown

by Suzelle



Category: Old Kingdom - Garth Nix
Genre: F/M, Gap Filler, Gen, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-20
Updated: 2014-12-20
Packaged: 2018-03-02 08:41:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2806376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Suzelle/pseuds/Suzelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sabriel discovers she is pregnant with her first child.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Enter World, Light Unshown

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kerioth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kerioth/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide, Kerioth! I adored your Old Kingdom prompts, and I hope I did at least one of them justice with this.
> 
> With many thanks to my betas, who will be revealed on New Year's.

The Morduant’s scream of rage faded beyond the Second Gate, and Sabriel lowered Kibeth with a heavy sigh. This one was only the latest in the seemingly endless onslaught of Dead, drawn, she could only assume, by the power vacuum left by Kerrigor’s absence. She had hoped that three months of hard work would have lessened the tide somewhat. Still, she preferred her current occupation over Touchstone’s, who labored day and night in search of a way to mend the broken Charter Stones.

Something still did not feel quite right, and Sabriel’s eyes narrowed as she surveyed the river around her. There was another spirit that still lingered with her in the Second Precinct—one living, not Dead. She laid a hand on her sword, wondering if some unknown necromancer lurked in the shadows. But this did not feel like a necromancer. Its grasp on life was feeble, clinging with a new sense of uncertainty, almost as if…

She swayed on the spot, and glanced down at her stomach in horror.

_Oh no._

_Oh,_ no.

***

The Abhorsen’s house was a closer refuge than Belisaere, a small blessing for which she was grateful. She would need to tell Touchstone sooner rather than later, but in this moment, in these first days…

She had only come to the house a handful of times since Kerrigor’s defeat, and never for more than a day or two at a time. It was strange to her still, a home she might have had in another life. Still, the sight of the whitewashed walls looming up in the middle of the Ratterlin brought her comfort, and she made her way across the stepping-stones with increasing ease.

Once inside, the sendings were on hand to fuss over her. She shooed them away as best she could, and waited until the final cowled figure shut the door behind it before she sank down into the armchair near her bed and buried her head in her hands.

There were Charter spells to prevent pregnancy, of course, but they took time to prepare, and more often than not Sabriel and Touchstone only had a few fleeting moments together. The risk of foregoing the spell had always seemed worth it at the time—a foolish mistake, with all the arrogance of youth—

Sabriel pushed the thought away.  If there was one thing she had learned since taking up the bells, it was that there was little room for regret in the life of an Abhorsen—especially now, with the kingdom in the state it was. She and Touchstone simply could not afford to look back, to second-guess the sacrifices and mistakes they had made. Not when so much depended on them.

There was little left to do but reorient herself once more, begin to plan for a future that included not just herself and Touchstone but their unborn child as well. Still, the thought filled her with a sick sense of panic, an added responsibility she just did not need.

“I’m not ready,” she whispered to herself. “Charter’s sake, _we’re_ not ready.”

The words brought back a grim memory, that same feeling of panic felt at this house just a few months before, and she smiled in spite of herself. The feeling of being woefully unprepared was starting to become second nature.

***

At a loss for what to do with herself, Sabriel finally made her way up the winding stairs into the library. She had never really had the time to explore the house in great detail, not in the way she would like, and she found herself drawn to the mountains of books that reminded her of the study rooms of Wyverly College.

The workings of the library were still unfamiliar to her, with a cataloguing system that was nothing like the one in place at Wyverly. At last she turned to a sending, who had been standing patiently at her side.

“Do you keep any personal accounts from previous Abhorsens?” she asked. “Memoirs, journals, anything like that?”

The sending nodded once and glided back into the stacks. It returned a quarter of an hour later with a stack of disarrayed notebooks and leaflets piled as high as its head, and with a vague air of satisfaction. Sabriel murmured her thanks, and gingerly picked up the top notebook, its thin cover crumbling off in her hands.

“Looking for ghosts, Abhorsen?” a voice mewed behind her. “I believe you’re in the wrong realm for such a search.”

Sabriel jumped in her chair and looked behind her to see a little white cat stalking towards the desk.

“I thought you’d be asleep,” said Sabriel, careful to leave any suspicion out of her voice. Her hand twitched, eager to reach for Saraneth.

“Ranna seems to have loosened her hold on me, for a time,” said Mogget smugly. “I suppose she sensed I would want to be awake for this particular visit.”

“Of course,” sighed Sabriel, heart sinking.

He twitched his tail. “It’s really quite irresponsible of you both, you know. You are the last Abhorsen, just as he is the last of the royal line. The more the blood spreads out through the Kingdom the better. But of course, why ask me…”

“I don’t see how it’s any of your business,” snapped Sabriel, and Mogget smirked. “How do you even know…” she trailed off, unable to say it.

“You learn to pick up on things, as a servant of the Abhorsen,” he answered. “Though it helps that you two are not subtle in the slightest.” Sabriel flushed but ignored him, and went back to her work.

The journals of past Abhorsens would prove to have their own uses, and Sabriel lost herself in accounts of Free Magic creatures and Greater Dead that had come from beyond the Seventh Gate. She bookmarked these to take back to Belisaere, to make sure she would have them on hand for any future encounters with such magic. But none of the accounts seemed to touch on the children of Abhorsens, or how one chose to balance raising a child while keeping the Dead at bay.

“Mogget, how…” she hesitated briefly. “What do Abhorsens do, when they have children? I imagine shipping them off to Ancelstierre was not an option for most.”

She heard the wry resentment in her voice and sighed, wondering how things might have been different if her father had raised her here, in the house. If his long absences would have been easier or harder to bear, understanding now how unpredictable the life of an Abhorsen could be.

_“I have not been an ideal parent, I know,”_ her father’s words echoed in her head. _“None of us ever are.”_

“Many of them didn’t,” Mogget answered simply. “Your great-aunt chose not to marry, and lived a happier life for it. That’s why the title went to her nephew next. But she had the luxury of remaining childless. Like it or not, you have a responsibility to continue the line, lest the Dead rise up and the kingdom fall.”  

“Yes, I know,” Sabriel sighed. “I only…I hadn’t intended for it to happen so soon…”

Mogget sighed, and jumped up onto the table. “I’m not in the business of paying compliments, Abhorsen. But you are as capable and compassionate a member of your sorry line as I’ve seen in generations. I have little doubt that you are up to the task of parenthood. And that mad king of yours will make a fine father, if you let him. All you have to do is keep yourself alive for the next few months. Which, given the idiocy you’ve led us through, might be easier said than done.”

Sabriel smiled in spite of herself, and scratched Mogget behind the ears.

“Well,” she said, “we’ve made it this far, haven’t we?”

 


End file.
